i used to know how to delete a blog. i think.
Archival Vlorbik
ARCHIVAL VLORBLOG
VLORBLOG: 2003
Old entries -- the new stuff is here.Vlorbik
- My e-mail goes to vlorbik@aol.com. Here's my blog.
- Remote logins: AOL. . . FTP. . . CCSC. . . US Bank. . .
- My academic work and my union work.
- Some essays and reviews; some stories and verse.
- Hundreds of posts in alt.zines and in rec.arts.books.
- Athaliah (Queen of Judah).
-
Topical stuff
and General Reference.
- Math and Ed and Math Ed.
- Psychology and Philosophy.
- Religion and Politics.
- Media generally; movies and music and paintings.
- Zines:
A--D and
E--M and
N--Z.
- Publishers and distros; online zine reviews; other zine pages.
- The Ten Page News and Indy Unleashed
- Chip Rowe's resource guide.
- Other print media: books and comics. Also libraries.
- Some computer related links.
- About me and these pages. Some stuff by friends.
- Other Owen
Thomases.
January 2, 2004
More matter with less art.Links
Send e-mail!
Aaron Swartz
academicgame
apostropher
Armed and Dangerous
Arthur D. Hlavaty
ashabot Bellona Times
Bells and Whistles
The Bigge Idea
blogenspiel
Body and Soul
Bookslut
Brokentype
Brooklyn BloggEd
Busy Busy Busy
Chaos Theory
Cold Springs Shops
Comics Worth Reading
Col's Progressive Alliance
The Cranky Professor
Critical Mass
Crooked Timber
Doc Searls
easily distracted
EdBlogger Praxis
Ektopos
Employment Blawg
Eye Control
Follow Me Here...
Frogs and Ravens
george h. williams
Glacial Erratics
Hollyism
Household Opera
Idiot Programmer
Invisible Adjunct
Isomorphisms
Jerod's Beeper
Julian's Jabberings
The Joe Kenehan Center
jill/txt
The Lefty Directory
librarian.net
Library Weblogs
The Literary Saloon
Making Contact
Martinblog
Maud Newton
Media Diet
Mediaocracy
Michael Bérubé
mike.whybark.com
The Minor Fall
news from me
Number 2 Pencil
Old Hag
Optical Sloth
Papercuts
Pathologically Polymathic
Pedantry
Poopsheet Reviews
READIN
Relevant History
Rhetorica
Robot Wisdom
Root Blog
Sadly, No!
a schoolyard blog
Sclerotic Rings
slide:rule
Three-toed Sloth
Toad Hall
Travelling Shoes
ULA news/rumors
Uncle Jazzbeau's
vitia
WVSR
What goes on . . .
Zizka
December 31, 2003
I seem to've come in too late to get a t-shirt from IOCNM. Check out their logo anyway.Here's a report on Birmingham's Literary Circus.
December 30, 2003
I've just placed a big order with Microcosm -- Aj Michel having brought to my attention that this most excellent of distros is having something of a financial crisis. First time I've ever used PayPal. What are you still doing here?
December 29, 2003
Eszter Hargittai led off a a discussion of courseware in Crooked Timber a few weeks back.
December 28, 2003
Ladies and gentlemen: Möbius strip molecules (thanks to Sclerotic Rings).
December 27, 2003
I've been ignoring all those "what [fill in the blank] are you?" quizzes -- as papercuts observed, these "aren't nearly as as fun" when you're not "goofing off at work". But when supergee referred me to this presidential candidates poll and it looked pretty interesting. They nailed my positions pretty well, to wit:
1. Your ideal theoretical candidate. (100%)
2. Green Party Candidate (93%)
3. Socialist Candidate (80%)
4. Sharpton, Reverend Al - Democrat (68%)
5. Kucinich, Rep. Dennis, OH - Democrat (59%)
6. Dean, Gov. Howard, VT - Democrat (59%)
7. Clark, Retired General Wesley K., AR - Democrat (53%)
8. Moseley-Braun, Former Senator Carol, IL - Democrat (53%)
9. LaRouche, Lyndon H. Jr. - Democrat (50%)
10. Gephardt, Rep. Dick, MO - Democrat (49%)
11. Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat (41%)
12. Edwards, Senator John, NC - Democrat (40%)
13. Libertarian Candidate (39%)
14. Phillips, Howard - Constitution (30%)
15. Lieberman, Senator Joe, CT - Democrat (24%)
16. Hagelin, Dr. John - Natural Law (10%)
17. Bush, President George W. - Republican (6%)
December 26, 2003
Here -- with reader comments -- are "Autism in a Needle?" and "Eli Lilly and Thimerosal", by Annette Fuentes (from In These Times 11/11/03). I read these pieces when they came out (I subscribe to the magazine) but didn't give 'em much thought until I came across two offhand comments in Martin Gardner's quasi-recent collection Are Universes Thicker Than Blackberries? (here's its amazon.com page) dismissing any connection between injections and autism. I sort of suspect knee-jerk trust-the-expertsism on Gardner's part here -- even Homer nods.From my two-hours research since then, there seems at least to be evidence of serious hanky-panky; see "CDC Study Raises Level of Suspicion" (from Insight, 12/8/03). Then there's the infamous Eli Lilly Rider in the Homeland Security Bill.
Moms Against Mercury placed this ad today, according to their webpage. Here are SafeMinds and TEST Foundation. A yahoo discussion group. Oh, and a list of "nonprofits" and from WHALE. Also, "Innoculated into oblivion" (Salon 4/13/00).
Meanwhile, this page on thimerosal at the CDC: "there is no evidence . . ." for claims that it contributes to mental illnesses.
December 25, 2003
Androo Robinson's Cryptozoa was recognized with an independent press award (for "general excellence -- zines") in Utne this month. Congratulations to the worthy winner.It's probably not presuming too far to see Chris Dodge's hand in this selection; Utne's "Street Librarian" is in any case among the greatest ambassadors for zines in the english-speaking world.
December 23, 2003
There's a new issue of the best doggone Chapter Newsletter I've ever found -- AAUP at the U. of Missouri, KC.
December 22, 2003
Here are some Math Problems for the Young and Impressionable, by Christopher Genovese at Signal + Noise.I'm quoted here plugging The Toucan's First Ten. Also at TeachMath.net (without the citation; it's from my "Some Contradictions of Education Reform" paper). There are a few (very few) links here from other blogs.
Steven Baum's Unusual Literature page at Ethel the Blog.
A Referrer System from Stephen's Web.
Mathematical LEGO Sculptures.
December 19, 2003
Planned Obsolescence has much the most interesting comment on a thread in Invisible Adjunct (next most is Chun the Unavoidable's). The discussion's about the annual boilerplate "Ain't academics whacky" coverage of the MLA conference -- curiously reminiscent of the "ZAP! POW! Comics aren't just for kids anymore!" stories one has seen regularly for over thirty years now.Holy jeewillikers! Half an hour after writing the previous paragraph, I've discovered that Jessica Crispin has mentioned this kind of comics coverage today (in Bookslut)!
Also good in IA recently: What is a Guild? and Who's Minding the Store?.
Aaron Swartz's NY Times link generator. Also his redaction of FLEEP, by Jason Shiga.
Eric Raymond's Cthulhu and Christ: commentary on a Jack Chick takeoff by Howard Hallis.
A report on blogs in <A HREF="http://www.guardian.co.uk/"The Guardian (hat tip: Doc Searles). Also this blog review site (via jill/txt).
December 16, 2003
As far as I know, the Women's Ecumenical Choir is still planning a show in City Center Mall this Thursday (12/18). It'll be followed closely by a meeting of Columbus NION (local branch of Not In Our Name).Hmmm . . . the editor seems to be working again.
Bootstrap Institute . . . Borders Employees Union. . . the pepys project. . .
December 13, 2003
So this morning I was downtown at the office -- it's really nice there between quarters when nobody's around -- and decided to write a blog entry. But when I went to paste the URL for a new link (to Mark Evanier's blog) I got some weird message about not enough memory; close a program & try again. Well, I wasn't running much of anything but did as I was told; nope. Reboot; nope. Try another computer (on the same network); no help here. MS Notepad has become hosed officewide.Long story longer: I tried Word and it worked (as well as Word can ever be said to "work"); discovered to my surprise that it thinks it knows HTML. This could be interesting. Who knows, maybe even useful. So I created a GeoCities account to to post a draft into. Sure enough, merely following instructions creates buggy code ("unterminated string constant; do you wish to continue running scripts") -- but there are possibilities here and I might end up firing AOL.
PS: I've put in some work on my comics page (that's how I found Evanier's stuff).
December 8, 2003
Asha Errata has been doing a blog (a journal about maintaining her webpage); I mention it now mostly because she's also got one called Indie Writers (with very infrequent updates), wherein I now find yet another event announcement: Readable Theatre (Dec. 13, Carson City NV). Admittedly, it's a poetry reading -- the kind of thing I'd ordinarily drive across town to avoid -- but I read her one-act when she published it as a zine (Ghostwriter) and liked it alright. Moreover, she's an outstanding citizen of alt.zines (the only newsgroup I read regularly).I recently posted to a thread in Isomorphisms, based in its turn on an entry in Number 2 Pencil: stupid management tricks in elementary algebra.
December 7, 2003
The Perpetual Motion Roadshow is doing the west coast next week -- 4 indy press performers hit 7 cities in 8 days. Details are at No Media Kings.Zine Guide and Diatribe ( www.diatribemedia.com ; browser-crashing scripts) are presenting an Evening of Love and Hate at Quimby's (in Chicago) on the 10th, closely followed by cartoonist Androo Robinson on the 13th; the latter event is somehow associated with SevenTen Bishop.
Also on the 13th: the Underground Currents zine fair at DC's Brian McKenzie Infoshop.
I know most of this stuff because Jerianne Zine World told me.
December 6, 2003
Here's an announcement for The Literary Circus (December 14 in Birmingham) from the ULA fanpage (Underground Literary Alliance). Also I finally updated my zines pages like I said I would: lots of new SF stuff in particular.
December 5, 2003
I'm done with classes (but still have a few final exams next week).
Meanwhile, according to a recent release from the NWU (National Writer's Union; I'm a member), "tens of thousands" of workers will observe Human Rights Day on 12/10, with a focus on collective bargaining rights. A link to a list of regional actions is provided. Nothing much going on in Columbus Ohio I'm afraid.Democratic Socialists of Central Ohio.
Berube on "Standards of Reason in the Classroom".
November 19, 2003
Lots of cool stuff recently at academicgame (though some of the internal links seem not to work -- blame Blogger™, I suppose).
November 11, 2003
There's an Indy Media Expo this coming weekend in Cinci; also some discussion of same in Cincinnati Blog (scroll down to Sunday 11/9). Of course I'm skipping it.
November 9, 2003
The new Xerox Debt (#12) is out; I should be adding new links to my zines pages forthwith.
November 7, 2003
This Be The Media conference in Madison this weekend (11/ 7--9) looks promising. Of course I won't be there. We'll maybe take in a movie or something here in Columbus.
October 30, 2003
The press conference I've just come home from is described here (page down to "Ohio"). Two state legislators, the head of Ohio AFT, a bunch of colleagues . . . and hardly any press.
October 23, 2003
Baby Lindy and the Drug Mothers are opening for Screaming Urge tomorrow night -- Friday 10/24 -- at High Five in Columbus (High St. and 5th Ave.). I oughta be there from about 9:00. Wheee!
October 16, 2003
Canzine is tomorrow but we ended up not going. I'm also missing the Fall meetings of Ohio MAA and OhioMATYC. What with all the writing I'm not doing and the papers I'm not grading, all this inactivity has me just about wiped out. The OFT is supposed to be doing some press event about a story I mentioned earlier right here in Columbus to coincide with nationwide activity for Campus Equity Week (October 27--31).
September 24, 2003
Fall Quarter starts, for me, in a couple hours. What better time to have found a piece called Academia: it is a miserable place (in philosophy.com, via academicgame).
September 23, 2003
The support staff's strike at Yale has been settled (Yale Daily News); there's some discussion at Nathan Newman (dot org).
September 22, 2003
My homie Mike Whybark is blogging and has webbified Tussin Up (!) and The Gizmos Songbook (!!) a-and he refers to the WQAX Project by Eric Sinclair and Anne Zender and is just this incredible treasure-trove of ancient Bloomington history.
September 20, 2003
I've updated the first of my main zines pages; also I found a link to said pages saying that ". . . the obsessive effort involved in accumulating this information . . . boggles the mind" (Garlic Press).
September 12, 2003
The Labor Notes Conference in Detroit starts today. Since I'm no longer working as an organizer -- and barely as a teacher! -- I'm giving it a miss: no money.
September 11, 2003
Ohio House Bill No. 249 will (if passed) amend the vile 4117.01 by deleting "Part-time faculty members of an institution of higher education" from the list of those ineligible to petition the State Employment Relations Board for collective bargaining rights. More info at Gongwer and the Ohio Laws pages.
September 9, 2003
There's a short page (so far!) for new Quantitative Reasoning class -- which started last night and looks like a blast. The final for 148's tonight. I had to file several "senior" grades already but that's another rant.
September 1, 2003
I've just done a long-overdue edit on my math bookmarks (removing dead links; very little new) and selected a few of the links for my 148 class (whose final is in about a week).August 30, 2003
A poor workman blames his tools: one big reason for the infrequency of my posts here is that my AOL service keeps getting worse. Presumably those who "upgrade" get better . . . but dial-up access puts you on some sort of pay-no-mind list whereby you're shoved into a queue that somehow remembers to load ads but keeps you waiting eternally for mail or newsgroups or the web. I've been doing most of my browsing -- which hasn't been much -- at work but can't do site maintenance other than here at home.
August 24, 2003
Making Contact discusses the reasons she moved to Typepad. I'm all for it: I used to have to click "no" about nine times ("Do You Want To Continue Using Scripts") just to read it when she had Blogger.
August 21, 2003
I learned via BenT Steckler of this thread about comics blogs at Alternative Comics. Also that Harvey Pekar (of American Splendor) is blogging.
August 17, 2003
The new Zine World is out. Send Jerianne your four bucks right away.
August 14, 2003
The Midwest Zine Fest is this weekend in Detroit. Then the Cut & Paste tour passes through Bloomington (Boxcar Books, August 18) and Columbus (Whetstone Park, August 19); details are at Microcosm Publishing.
August 11, 2003
The Literary Saloon celebrates its first birthday today. Also there's a link to a complaint in Bookslut about yet another online source going subscribers-only for its reviews. The Saloon itself commonly links to sources that require a login; yick.
August 10, 2003
Congratulations to Amanda of Household Opera on her successful dissertation defense. Make that Doctor Amanda.
August 9, 2003
There's a new entry about voting methods by Henry Farrell at Crooked Timber. This has been quasi-standard material in the "math for poets" style terminal-introductory classes I've more or less specialized in at Capital and Ohio Dominican & is essential study for concerned citizens if any sort of democratic process is ever to be restored to our ex-republic. Here's a voting methods site by Robert Loring of the Center for Voting and Democracy and the mathematics and elections meta-page at the Math Forum.
August 8, 2003
Papercuts and mediageek published reports in their respective blogs yesterday about last weekend's Portland Zine Symposium. Also, The Whirligig says the benefit in Chicago was a "huge success" and promises more details. King Wenclas has written about the Chicago show in this Atlantic Forum page, but I expect this link to be volatile and so may remove it without notice. Finally, the San Francisco Zine Fest starts tomorrow.
August 4, 2003
Jump Cut features a piece about contingent faculty organizing on the net by John Hess in their #46 (Summer 2003).
August 2, 2003
The benefit for Cullen Carter is tomorrow at Chicago's Barrel Cafe. I was already considering not going before wrecking my car made up my mind. But you should go if you've got a chance . . .
July 30, 2003
I caused a wreck last night before work. I seem to be on something of a losing streak. Didn't even get to miss class.
July 29, 2003
I wrapped up my Monday night class yesterday. The Tuesday/Thursday continues of course. Meanwhile, there's all these books to schlep around. Invisible Adjunct has started a thread on unionization but don't expect miracles: it'll probably be dominated by free-marketeer trolling.
July 25, 2003
Back to Bloomington tomorrow. Meanwhile, I've learned that I'm losing another office -- the second of this year. Blag.
July 23, 2003
Good heavens. Factsheet 5 is stirring again. Says they'll honor old subscriptions, too.Also there's a new (online) issue of workplace: a journal of academic labor.
July 22, 2003
Bully Magazine slams The Believer for Tom Bissell's hit piece (July 2003) on the Underground Literary Alliance (more links at the ULA page). Credit where credit's due: Bissell is far more annoying than the ULA itself -- this is not as easy as it probably sounds.
July 21, 2003
My Bloomington trip was big fun. The guy who threw the party and the guy whose couch I crashed on walk to work on IU's fabulous campus in my beloved hometown from houses they own: more reasons to kick myself for trying to play it safe and ending up here.Considering how much time I voluntarily spend online in any given 24 hours, I missed it very little in the past 48. No new links today.
July 17, 2003
Making Contact is a mostly-academic blog mentioning "the labor movement . . . and . . . social justice". OK then. I found it via Household Opera (via Invisible Adjunct). Also mentioning a post at Phlebas about "Blog Coveting" : it seems I'm not the only one envious at what all these hundreds of articulate people have accomplished. Anyhow, I'm heading back to Making Contact right now to post some comments. Wheee!
July 16, 2003
It seems fairly likely that I'll start back on my meds today after a layoff of several weeks; I have it on good authority that I'll be less entertaining if this should come to pass. Too bad for my readers. I'm unlikely to post over the weekend since I'm heading to Bloomington to see some pals from grad school. I'm planning to visit Boxcar Books (for the first time) while I'm there. The weekend after that there's a high school reunion.
July 13, 2003
Scott McCloud asks us at scottmccloud.com to change our bookmarks to his (groundbreaking comics) blog. Trouble is, the new site crashes my browser with some buggy script. So I've duly removed the link from my list. Another classic case of "if it ain't broke, break it".
July 13, 2003
Here are a bunch of threads on economic issues from the Democratic Underground message board. Of course I'm certainly no Democrat -- voted for Nader and proud of it -- but very likely there are some discussions going on here that I'll find interesting. There's even a 3D gathering planned for Columbus on August 15 if I get *real* interested.
July 12, 2003
The Philly Zine Fest is tomorrow. I won't be there myself but the way I figure, if I had any readers this is the kind of thing they'd want to know.
July 10, 2003
Argh. I'm not doing the calc class at the summer institute after all (see the entries of July 1 & 3). I learned today that interviews were still going on for the position I thought I'd been hired for. To hell with it. Good luck getting somebody better than me for that very demanding position in the next four days. Here's "Calling Things By Their Names" (1998).
July 9, 2003
All knowledge is found in blogs: I was alerted to "Word Processors: Stupid and Inefficient" (Allin Cottrell) this morning in a thread at the Invisible Adjunct, of all places.
July 8, 2003
I set out to write an entry just now about how ticked off I am that Margaret Atwood denies that her recent novel Oryx and Crake -- which I'm about halfway through -- is SF ( since it "contains no intergalactic space travel, no teleportation, no Martians"). But then I had to spoil all my fun by checking Google.Sure enough it's been done to death. This Gallowglass piece cites Kathryn Cramer quoting a fatuous review by Sven Birkerts. Locus online lists several more reviews; a link to this USENET thread is provided by Apothecary's Drawer, along with the scolding Dame Atwood so richly deserves (May 2). Never mind then.
July 7, 2003
You can't tell the players without a program. This post by Martin Stabe helpfully catalogues some recent "mergers and aquisitions" amongst the scholarblahgrati. Crooked Timber in particular looks promising (though it's essentially empty so far).Meanwhile I've updated my Zine Resources page among others.
July 6, 2003
So the NEA takes the "anybody but B*sh" line -- a no-brainer of course. And I found it out from some sort of quasi-blog-like entity: Root Blog. But I'm still looking for a plain old personal page with periodical labor union stories. Better still: academic unions. Is anybody out there?PS Court Overturns Wal-Mart Union Ban.
July 4, 2003
My defection to the dark side ("quicker, easier, more seductive") continues: I've uploaded my review of John Gatto's Underground History of American Education before publishing the hardcopy version.
July 3, 2003
Updates. 1. I got the job. Along with my CLL and CSCC gigs, this'll make for a pretty tight schedule. 2. There's no contact info for the blog I mentioned yesterday. Anonymity is one thing but this is practically unheard-of. I've started to wonder if it isn't some vile PR firm's astroturf. I hope I'm just being paranoid. According to the cluetrain manifesto, one should be able to recognize a human voice. It isn't always easy.
July 2, 2003
Somebody started a blog called Math Ed Matters! a couple weeks ago. Not surprisingly, they appear to be pretty committed to "reform" as promulgated by the NCTM.For my part, while I agree with pretty much everything MEM! says in posts like "No More Excuses" and "One More Time, With Feeling", I'm generally much more in tune with counter-reformers like Mathematically Correct than the NCTM. This looks like a good time to mention my review of The Schools We Need and "Contradictions of Education Reform".
With any luck, there'll be some good discussions coming up.
July 1, 2003
So I applied to teach a class in the Summer Institute in Science and Mathematics today after meeting the director (Nyenty Arrey) by accident yesterday. This "real life" thing might have some advantages.
June 30, 2003
Classes start today at Columbus State, so I guess my summer vacation is over. We'll see how the blogging holds up. Meanwhile, here's my quasi-recent "Why I Teach Such Good Classes".
June 30, 2003
A.j. Michel's June 15 entry at Papercuts (the "blog*spot" linking feature for the entry itself appears to be busted) is a report on the Allied Media Conference where I saw her. She's planning to follow up with zine reviews, so you know I'll be checking back often.If I understand correctly, A.j. was one of the founders of Urbana-Champaign IMC (though she's leaving Champaign according to her zine). Anyhow, she's an all-around outstanding citizen; Vlorbik sez check it out.
June 29, 2003
There's very little on the blo'sphere about the labor movement & unionism. It sort of makes sense -- the players are (currently) mostly successful professionals of one sort or another. But it's still pretty depressing. Even such lefty sites as Lean Left and Left Wing Liberal Commie Agitator and The Lefty Directory seem preoccupied with to-me-pretty-much-pointless issues like the US election of 2004. uniondemocracy.blogspot.com rates another look.
Also, while I was searching, I found this Top 100 Corporate Criminals of the 1990s page at The Mad Prophet Blog, which is pretty cool.
June 29, 2003
askpang had some remarks in "Relevant History" recently about the badness of cellphone service in the USA . I'm the furthest thing in the world from an expert -- all I know is the first one I ever got doesn't f**king work and I'm not paying the next bill or any more after that. I told 'em so a couple weeks back but they still don't know since they don't bother having a human being read their e-mail (the bot sent me to -- another bot, which sent back a form to fill in; no thanks).
The guilty party here is T-Mobile; the phone in question is a "Sidekick". There's a web browser which works even worse -- much worse -- than the phone. I'm usually not an early adopter but I'm a sucker for the web and knew I'd have to try this thing the minute I first saw it (in NYC [where presumably service is better] in early February).
June 28, 2003
Unf rightly complained recently about a piece in the Chicago Reader for reviewing the artist's image and not the record: Liz Phair. Well, I got the record yesterday and have played it once. Probably I'll play it a whole bunch more: lots of interesting sounds -- though I think I prefer the lo-fi approach of her earlier stuff -- and her trademark touching raunchy wit. The most amusing thing about all this for me is that the indier-than-thou piece that Unf finds so annoying is in a rag whose very purpose is to sell eyeballs to advertisers.
June 28, 2003
I really oughta be doing my zine. Or anyway reading the new Xerox Debt.
June 27, 2003
Ever since I found about Invisible Adjunct (from some listserv related to my adjunct faculty union work) I've been checking it several times daily. It's caused me to look at several other blogs. Looks sort of fun. What the heck. I've known about librarian.net for quite a while and it's probably still my all-time favorite. I swiped the HTML code from READIN (but cut out most of the features so don't blame him for the way this looks).
